


Bucky the Smitten Barista

by nekomas_heart



Series: College Cuties and Coffee [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: College AU, Could be a series if people wanted more/sent prompts, Fluff beyond all reason I guess, I promise it's just pure nervous college boys and bad ass Natasha and there's no reason to be sad, M/M, Starbucks AU, The title started as a joke and then I fell in love with it idk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-29
Updated: 2014-06-29
Packaged: 2018-02-06 19:09:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1869117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nekomas_heart/pseuds/nekomas_heart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky decides the best option for flirting with Steve would be to purposely spell his name wrong every time he orders a drink. Steve, as usual, fears the worst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bucky the Smitten Barista

**Author's Note:**

> This came about because yesterday I got a delicious caramel frappuccino, and because I am absolutely in love with Bucky Barnes, I wished he was the guy who made it. Then I remembered that hilarious post from a barista in which he confessed to spelling names wrong on cups just for fun.
> 
> Originally posted to Steve-Loves-Bucky.tumblr.com
> 
> Ps. somehow every time I post here, the formatting gets silly. I really hope it looks alright for you! I also have a nasty habit of using the Canadian/English spelling of words. I am an American. It is a habit my writing professors never like... I'm sorry if I missed some in editing!

The first time it happened, Steve felt pity for the guy who made his drink. S-s-t-e-e-f was scribbled in black marker on the cup handed over to him. The barista responsible just watched Steve with a smile on his face. Steve smiled back wordlessly, took a sip of his drink, and left. Despite either being hard of hearing or somehow severely under-educated, the barista was still smiling kindly. It made the utter butchering of what Steve  _thought_  was an easy name no big deal.

 

The second time it happened, Steve became skeptical.  
  


"Venti caramel frap for…" the barista in charge of handing out finished drinks struggled for a moment. "Stiv?… St-eye-ve?" He held the drink up in the air for the customers to see.

Steve looked around for anyone else who ordered a venti caramel, but no one else did, so it had to be his. The barista who couldn’t spell ‘Steve’ last time was working at the blenders. That had to be what happened.

This time Steve’s cup read S-T-I-V-E in messy, cramped letters. The barista looked up from the spot he’d been wiping near the blender and smirked at Steve. The blond furrowed his brows in confusion and promptly left.

The barista huffed, bored.   
  
  
The third time in two weeks had Steve wondering if the barista’s sole purpose in life was to spell his name wrong and no one else’s. What was his problem? Steve found himself spacing out during his classes because of it. Did he ever treat this guy badly? Was this a revenge of some sort? Leave it to Steve to feel anxiety over a random Starbucks barista getting a kick out of misspelling his name.

 

"Listen, Nat." Said Steve as he dragged his best friend and roommate Natasha into the coffee shop a few days later. "That’s the guy." Steve covertly pointed to the barista from his last three visits and all of his daydreams since the  _first_  visit.  
  
"Mr. Tattoo?" She asked, blatantly checking him out. "He’s hot."  
  
Steve felt the back of his neck warm. Sure, the guy was hot, but clearly he had some issue with Steve, so there was no point. He spent a moment admiring the tattoo after Nat had pointed it out. The barista’s uniform t-shirt covered it up, but Steve assumed it must have been a full sleeve. It made his arm, at least what was visible, appear to be robotic.

  
"That shit is rad." Natasha praised and walked up to the counter with Steve on her heel once he quit staring and realised she had moved. All of a sudden he felt like he couldn’t find his footing, nervous. With a quick glance up at the goofy look on his face, Natasha stood in front of Steve (though she knew she couldn’t hide him with her tinier, shorter frame) and after getting the barista’s attention, did the ordering for them both.

  
"And who will these be for?" The barista asked. Steve hadn’t ordered from him before, so he’d never been close enough to clearly read his name tag. It read ‘Bucky’ between two messily drawn stars. In fact, the barista hadn’t actually ever spoken while Steve was in the shop before. His voice reminded Steve of the caramel he enjoyed so much in his coffee. The blond gulped and looked at his feet, trying his best to stay inconspicuous behind Natasha.

  
"The vanilla bean frap will be for Natasha, and the caramel frap is for Steve." She said coolly, digging in her bag for her card and making a show of being uninterested, if only for Steve’s sake.

  
"A caramel frap for Steve, huh?" The barista, “Bucky”, literally purred, and Steve felt caught and compelled to reveal himself. He stepped out from behind Natasha and straightened his back, mentally scolding himself for being a college sophomore with the sheepishness of a 12 year old girl.

  
"Yep. That would be me." He mumbled, as if Bucky wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them. He wanted to add  _'the guy whose name you keep fucking up'_ , but that would be unnecessarily confrontational. Honestly, if Steve worked at a college campus Starbucks, he’d probably try to stir up some trouble just for fun. He wasn’t sure why the barista got under his skin so badly when he’d just as quickly act the same way. It’s not even that Steve was mad at the guy… He just made Steve so… Uncertain? He tied Steve’s belly up in knots, whatever emotion that would be. Not a crush, though. Definitely not that.

  
Bucky’s eyes narrowed and flitted back and forth between Steve and Natasha, and then he frowned momentarily. “That’ll be $9.50.” He prompted, the fun tone from earlier gone from his voice, and he seemed almost annoyed with swiping her card and handing it back to her.  

  
Steve tried to see what Bucky was scribbling on their cups, but he couldn’t see. Natasha elbowed him and looked up at him quizzically. He shrugged back at her in response.

  
 _What the fuck’s wrong with him?_  She asked with the look.

  
 _Dunno._

_  
_They continued discussing the unbelievably broody (how cliche is that, seriously? Dark hair, light eyes, tattooed, and broody?) barista _that held absolutely zero percent of Steve’s interest_  in their practiced silent language while waiting for their drinks. No one else was waiting, so Steve didn’t get a chance to hear his name called before checking the cup. He looked at Natasha’s first, irrationally nervous to see his own.

  
N-a-t-a-s-h-a  sat neatly on one of the green lines. She hummed in satisfaction and took a sip, pleased at the taste. She shot a thumbs up at the girl working the blenders, and the girl ducked her head and smiled, raising her own thumb just a little.

  
Steve couldn’t help the dissatisfied huff he let out upon seeing his own name.

  
S-t-e-e-b  
  
He looked over to Bucky for an explanation, but the barista just leaned against the counter and whistled innocently, the hair around his face that had fallen from his ponytail blowing slightly with each note. He watched as Steve fussily opened his straw and shoved it in, closing his eyes in bliss at the delicious caffeine despite his annoyance.

  
Bucky was still looking at him when Steve opened his eyes again, his lips turned up at the corner and an unreadable look on his face. Flustered, Steve kept his head down and scurried for the door, almost knocking down a display in the process. Left behind, Natasha waved goodbye and followed after him.  
  
"I bet that guy thinks you like him." The other barista said to Bucky once they were gone.  
  
Bucky looked over at her and laughed. “You think?” He asked sarcastically but with humour in his tone.  
  
She shrugged and slung a towel over her shoulder. “You might wanna be careful flirting with customers when they’re with their girlfriends, though.” She suggested before leaving Bucky to go check the stock room.  
  


His smile dropped, and Bucky blew his hair out of his face with a sigh, pressing his face to the counter.

 

***

 

Steve had been actively avoiding Starbucks for a week when Natasha finally stopped him from going directly back to their apartment after the Spanish class they took together.  
  
"For God’s sake, why are you being such a little bitch?" She asked, exasperated. Steve would have been offended if she hadn’t been this blunt since the day he met her.  
  
"Okay," he started, "one, you need to get off my dick about this; why do you care if I go back to Starbucks or not? Two, I am  _not_  being a little bitch.”  
  
"Okay," Natasha repeated him sternly, "you  _are_  being a little bitch because  _one_ ,” she then mocked his voice, and he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “you knew exactly why I was going to yell at you before I expressly yelled at you for it.  _Two_ , you just denied being a little bitch. Therefore, little bitch.”  
  
"I just don’t…" Started Steve, but he wasn’t sure what exactly he _just didn’t_ , so he let his sentence die without elaborating.  
  
"You’re seriously acting like a blushing virgin, which I mean, you  _are_ one, but you are grown enough not to act like it, Rogers.” Steve felt his face grow hot. “You’re literally fucking blushing right now!” Exclaimed Natasha, taking his textbook and hitting his shoulder with it.   
  
“Nat, come on…” Steve pleaded, but there was no fight to it. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to win the argument, if that’s what they were even doing.   
  
“No. You will not “Nat” me right now. Clint and I are getting sick of watching you third wheel with us on dates. You constantly look like a kicked puppy, Steve.”   
  
Yikes. Steve knew he was pathetic, but it sounded so awful when she said it.   
  
“You know I love you,” she added genuinely. “And because I love you, I think you should go talk to that guy who’s been so blatantly flirting with you for, like, the past month that it’s making me sick to look at you.”   
  
“He hasn’t been flirting-” Protested Steve, but Nat was having none of it.   
  
“He spells your name wrong on purpose and then stares at you longingly while you take your first sip, shut the fuck up, okay? He is pining for your ass.”   
  
Steve choked on air, and she patted his back roughly. She’d lead them right to Starbucks during her… pep talk(?), and she waited for Steve to right himself after the coughing fit before speaking.  
  
“I’m gonna wait outside, so just hurry up and ask him out already.” She gave him what was a gentle shove in her book but in reality sent Steve almost tripping into the building.   
  
The rush of cool air that greeted him upon opening the doors was welcome relief from the still surprisingly hot October air, and he looked for Bucky amongst the 4 baristas behind the counter. His heart sunk when he didn’t see him, but one of the baristas waved him over, and he recognised her as the girl who was working with Bucky the last time.   
  
“You lookin’ for Buck?” She asked, but the look in her eyes suggested she already knew the answer. Steve nodded, wetting his lips. His mouth felt impossibly dry. Why did he constantly behave like his life was a straight-to-DVD pre-teen romance? “He just went on break.” She nodded behind Steve, so he turned.   
  
Bucky sat at a table, his feet propped up on the empty chair opposite the one in which he sat. His apron and shirt were crumpled on the table next his drink, leaving him looking rather irresistible in the thin tank top he’d had underneath his uniform. Steve gulped, taking in Bucky’s full tattoo. He was right about it being a sleeve, but it went up and over his shoulder as well, making Bucky’s entire left arm look made of metal. A bright red star sat in the midst of the silver of his bicep, and Steve felt those stomach knots come back at the sight of it.   
  
Maybe it was because Bucky looked vulnerable wearing so little clothes compared to what Steve normally saw; maybe it was because Natasha had practically shoved him into the Starbucks on a dare. Maybe it was because Steve felt truly and deeply fed up with being alone. Steve wasn’t quite sure what force moved his feet toward the table, and he had no idea what made him rip Bucky’s earbuds from his ears. That was totally not what he had planned on doing.   
  
“Hey! What the fu-” Bucky looked up at Steve and stopped. Once he’d gotten Bucky’s attention, a blush crept over Steve’s face, and he felt just as foolish as ever. He gently handed back the earbuds after holding them for what was probably just a second too long. He was doing this whole thing wrong already.   
  
“What’s up, Stevie?” Bucky asked, smoothing back into his seat and leaning his arm across the back of his chair. The purring tone was back in his voice, and Steve felt hot all over. “Where’s Natasha?” Bucky asked, unable to mask the jealousy in his voice. Steve’s heart pounded so loud and hard he was sure everyone in the shop could hear it. He looked around to see if it was causing tables to shake.   
  
It wasn’t.   
  
“W-why? You jealous?” He stammered, attempting to sound… anything but shy and nervous, really. Bucky’s smirk faltered, his own cheeks reddening enough for Steve to feel less embarrassed. Bucky opted to look down at his phone rather than answer, and Steve rubbed the back of his neck. “She’s not my girlfriend, you know.” Bucky looked up so fast Steve was concerned he’d hurt himself. “And… She told me you’ve been flirting with me, so look,” he inhaled deep, preparing himself for humiliation. The whole shop was watching them at this point. “If you wanna go on a date with me, why don’t you just ask?”   
  
For the first time since Steve began frequenting the place, it was dead silent. He looked around bashfully, noting the interested faces all around. The baristas quit mixing drinks. Everyone was waiting for Bucky to speak.   
  
“Fine, punk.” He said finally, the smug confidence that made Steve’s knees weak returning to his voice and posture. “Meet me here at seven tonight.”   
  
Steve blinked several times. “O-okay?” He asked, though he wasn’t even sure what he was asking, if he was asking anything. He wasn’t all that sure if he was even speaking.   
  
“One more thing.” Bucky prompted Steve to come closer, and when the blond was close enough, he grabbed Steve’s shirt collar and pressed a quick, chaste kiss to his lips. “See you at seven,” he whispered against them and gently pushed Steve back when he was finished.   
  
The entire room bursted into claps and cheering, and Steve made his way back to Natasha wide-eyed and lightheaded.   
  
She heard the cheering when he opened the door and turned to look at him shuffling toward her with a dreamy smile plastered onto his face.   
  
“What the fuck did you do?” She shook him, looking past him at the bros high-fiving and cheering  _still_.   
  
“I guess I have a date tonight?”


End file.
